Everyman's Library In Search Of Lost Time Volume 3

Quick normal delivery; books is pristine.

It's preposterous to review this masterpiece. So I'll contribute something else. I find that the Kilmartin-Enright update, while no different in texture than it, is more readable than the Scott Moncrieff. Up pops another thought. It's been decades since I read the novel. Perhaps - who knows? - I've become more readerly.

There are three qualities to comment upon: the complete novel, the translation, and the kindle specifics. I'm going to post this review for all six volumes of the Prendergast series. If you've read it elsewhere, I apologise. I'd guess that my most helpful remarks will be about the kindle implementation. I'll cover all six books of this Prendergast edition. There is nothing in the general formatting to deter purchase of the kindle version. The complete novel is so large and there are so many characters that X-Ray would have been good. This series doesn't have it. But each volume does have a synopsis at the end which lists the elements of the narrative (for example “Swann's first meeting with Odette”; “Odette's vulgarity”), together with the page number. At the time of writing (June 2015), the usefulness of this feature varies from volume to volume. Its value is greatest in “In the shadow of young girls”, “The Guermantes Way”, and “The Prisoner and the Fugitive”. In all three the page number is a link, enabling one to jump directly to the page referenced. If, like me, you want to re-read passages, this feature is excellent. In “The Way by Swann's” and “Finding time again” the page numbers don't link directly to the referenced passages: you have to Go To the page number. Finally “Sodom and Gomorrah” doesn't contain page numbers, so those quoted in the Synopsis are almost useless. I assume that this is a production error, and I've informed Amazon. I've read that the Kilmartin/Enright edition has an index of place names and proper names and a thematic index, but I've no idea how well these are implemented on the kindle. I enjoyed the novel, but it has its weaknesses: the long sentences are quite often hard to comprehend without re-reading, and some passages are over-long. So I wouldn't expect everyone to enjoy it. You just have to try it. I opted to spend about £30 on the Predergast series, after starting the free (for kindle) Scott Moncrieff edition. I could have lived with the Scott Moncrieff but I just preferred a more modern text. I'm not able to compare the Prendergast series translations with Kilmartin and Enright's. Occasionally I wanted to compare the translation with Proust's French. This was hampered by the Prendergast series being based on the 1987 Pléiade edition, which is not in the public domain and so too expensive for me. There's an informative “General Editor's Preface” at the beginning of “The Way by Swann's”. I'd expect it would be included within the free sample available for kindle.

Third class product..Don't buy this version....paper quality and printing is really bad..

Excellent service and product